Costa Rica

Josh and I had the opportunity to go to Costa Rica with some friends for a vacation. It was so nice to be able to spend time with Josh for 10 days. He works a lot, so I was in heaven getting to spend so much time with him. There a a ton of pics, so don't feel like you need to look at them, but I print my blog so I wanted to remember all we did!

This picture is at the hotel by the airport we stayed at the first night.

When we first got there the airport lost Josh's luggage, so he had to share some clothes with his friend the first couple days. He was a really good sport about it though.

The weather was perfect. It's their summer right now, so it was nice and warm.

On our way to our first destination,( Arenal; the rainforest/volcano area ) we stopped at a local fruit stand and got some amazing fruit. We didn't realize that bananas tasted so good when they're fresh.(totally different, way sweeter.)

We spotted a sloth on the way to our hotel.

This was our hotel we stayed at. So pretty.

Getting some food at one of the local restaurants.

Breakfast at our hotel. It was so fun, we just ate right outside.

Breakfast. The cute little ladies would make our breakfast when we told them we were ready to eat.

We did a zip line tour through the rainforest that was really cool. I definitely had to overcome my fears to do this zip line. The last time I went on a zip line it broke on me and I was very hurt. Some of you may remember that. It was just after I graduated high school. Anyway, I was scared stiff and felt so sick to my stomach. As you can tell by the picture I was having second thoughts about doing it.

Josh picked me up and told me I was doing it, even if he had to carry me the whole way there.

We rode a tractor to the top where the tour began.

We had to walk across this bridge, which was really high and wobbly. I held on tight as Josh kept wiggling the whole bridge.

Getting ready to go. The tour had 11 zip lines. You zip line across the jungle and then hiked to the next zip line. The highest zip line was 500 ft and the longest one was over a mile long. And some of them were so fast.

It was so neat to see all the beautiful scenery as we went on the zip lines.

Once I go over my fear I really enjoyed it and thought this was one of the best things we did the whole trip.

This was the La Fortuna waterfall that we zip lined over(absolutely gorgeous.)

This must have been one of my first rides, because my face looks pretty terrified.

There goes my man!

We went to a little village at the top. People don't live there anymore, but these were actual homes they lived in. It was pretty cool to see.

Once we were done with the zip lines we got to ride horses to the bottom. I loved this.

Of course, Josh had to go to the front and he was way in front of everyone galloping away!

We found a rope swing where the locals go. It was actually really high. There was a waterfall right there too. The boys were doing back flips and all kinds of crazy stuff off of it.

Josh, on the rope swing. The locals were laughing at us the whole time. We had fun with them though.

There was a lot of fruit on the trees at our hotel. Josh climbed the tree to get some bananas.

Some coconuts.

In Arenal we went to this resort to swim in the hot springs. We didn't stay there, since the rooms start at $500/night. They filmed the Bachelor here a few seasons ago. (I thought that was pretty neat.)

The swim up bar.

The hot springs were all natural springs and some of them were very warm. It was kind of crazy, the two nights we were there we pretty much had the whole place to ourselves.

There were 25 different hot spring pools. We had fun trying them all out.

Just another one of the hot springs.

Eating some dinner. The food was really good and I have been craving it ever since we left.

At a little hole in the wall place we went for lunch one day. I was a little scared to eat here, but it wasn't too bad and no one got sick.

Me and Becca enjoying one of the many sunsets. And yes I look like a giant next to her!

The rest of our vacation we spent in Manuel Antonio(the beach spot.)

This was our last hotel we stayed at. It was a condo we shared with our friends. It had 2 bedrooms and 2 bathrooms and a full kitchen. It was a great place to be.

We were lucky to get to go to a farmer's market, which was only going on for 2 days. We got tons of fresh fruit, veggies, eggs, breads, and other fun things.

Becca, with all the fruit we bought at the farmer's market.

One of the restaurants on the beach. It's so cool there, because all the restaurants are outside and just have roofs over them.

Our first day at the beach....

I think we watched the sunset every day we were there. We also took walks on the beach every night.

One of the many waters we bought. We spent way too much money of bottled water. I didn't want to chance getting sick, so we had to buy a lot of water.

We found an LDS church there. We went to their sacrament which was so neat, even though we couldn't understand anything they said. It's cool to know that even in a different country the church is the same!

This is the church building. Only had parking for 3 cars, one of which was ours. It was all gated up with barbed wire on top of the fence. They have a big problem with theft down there where the church was.

The boys were trying to catch some crabs, which we later found out is against the law there.

This was the area we went snorkeling. We went snorkeling a few different days. We saw lots of cool fish. My favorite were the tangs and the puffer fish.

Our friends, Rick and Becca.

Since the boys couldn't go deep sea fishing, because it was $600 they decided to buy a spear gun. I can't believe how much fun they had with that thing. They were like little kids out there and they would do it for hours.

Josh and Rick with some of the fish they speared.

Cleaning the fish at our hotel. They didn't end up cooking them, so we gave them to some locals and they were stoked.

Right by the beach there were lots of monkeys(the one on the sign.) You had to be careful, because they would try and come steal your stuff.

We rented some surf boards and boogie boards and we had a blast doing that.

Going on wave runners on the ocean was one of my favorite things we did! We chased a group of about 20 dolphins all over. It was so neat to be right next to them like that! I have always had a thing for dolphins ever since I was little. I just think they are so amazing.

One of the many yummy smoothies.

We got invited to a bonfire on the beach one night by some of the locals. It was fun to go, but we definitely didn't fit in since we don't drink alcohol or smoke pot. They were pretty funny though.

Josh relaxing on our patio at the hotel.

At our hotel.

The boys made breakfast our last morning! Potatoes, eggs, and smoothies, everything fresh.

The Las Cascadas hotel.

A toucan. We could hear these birds every morning so loud. They're amazing birds.

We were driving one day and just about ran over this little parrot. When we got out of the car he wasn't scared of us one bit.

I don't remember the name of these, but they are a cross between a raccoon and a opossum.

There was a bridge you could look over and see these wild crocodiles. We counted about 25. It made me a little uneasy looking over, thinking that if you fell over you're dead!

Another cute monkey.

Stealing some bananas. I could watch these guys all day. I thought they were so funny.

We saw some macaws flying.

Since Josh and Rick are both Firefighters/paramedics they were really interested in seeing the ambulances down there. This one actually had patients in it. The patients didn't look good either. The driver wanted to stop and take a picture of the sunset. And they were definitely in no hurry. The boys couldn't believe there were patients in there.

We stopped at a local fire station. They guys loved talking to the firefighters. They were instant friends when they told them they were also firefighters.

Another ambulance. The medical down there is kind of scary we found out. We were glad none of us had to go to the hospital down there.

The boys and the "yaris" our rental car. It had "full coverage" so the boys were definitely not careful with it. :)

We had a great trip. My sweet mother in law watched Bentley while we went. We are so grateful she did that for us. I had kind of a hard time the last couple of days, because I really missed Bentley, but once we talked to her on the phone I was ok, because I knew she was having fun and well taken care of!